'iCarly's' Cosgrove brings tour to Westbury

Miranda Cosgrove's parents thought her time in show biz would last a few weeks at most.

"Originally, I thought I'd just go on a couple of auditions and see how it went with acting," the star of Nickelodeon's hit series "iCarly" said last week. "I think my parents are still shocked that I got my own show and have done as much as I have."

That was years ago, of course. And now Cosgrove - a star of TV ("Drake & Josh") and film ("School of Rock," voicing Margo in "Despicable Me") - is in the midst of her first concert tour.

"I've never done anything like this before in my entire life," she says of her "Dancing Crazy" tour with Greyson Chance - which comes to NYCB Theatre at Westbury on Sunday. "It's one of those experiences you never forget."

We caught up with the Los Angeles native after she arrived in Manhattan for a short break with friends . . . and shopping.

I almost called you Carly. Do you get that a lot?

Yeah. I think the younger fans think I really am the character, so they call me Carly - like probably 10 and under. Some parents do, too.

Way back when you were making "School of Rock," did you ever think you'd have a record out and be on tour one day?

I always wanted to write songs and be a singer, but I don't think I thought it would ever happen. And then when I did my show "iCarly," I did the theme song and that's how everything got started musically.

Your new single, "Dancing Crazy," sounds a little more, um, dancey than the stuff on last year's "Sparks Fly" album.

Yeah, I definitely wanted to do some fun songs that people could dance to. . . . And because I'm doing some of the new songs on tour, I wanted people to get up and dance in the audience. I did a duet with Rivers Cuomo and that was less on the dancey side and had more of a Weezery feel to it.

How was it working with him? Are you a Weezer fan?

It was really a cool experience. He's awesome and I'm a huge Weezer fan, and so is my mom and all my friends.

What other kinds of music do you listen to?

I'm kind of all over the place. We've been listening to a lot of different music on the tour bus. My band has had me listen to Mötley Crüe and Radiohead, and a lot of bands I really haven't heard before. And I really like Tom Petty and the Rolling Stones.

You're 17 . . . you thinking about college?

I've applied to five colleges - USC, NYU, Yale, Brown and Berkeley - and I've taken the SAT twice. I'm thinking I might defer for a year, but I just wanted to make sure I got all the applications in.

What's next for "iCarly"?

I really get excited about doing new seasons. Every season we grow a lot and change and do different things, even though we keep some of the same things about our characters, we mature with each season or we get even freakier.

Do you guys really eat spaghetti tacos?

We do! I've had spaghetti tacos at my house twice. My mom is a pretty good cook and she decided she wanted to make 'em. We once had a big battle and a lot of people made them and brought them in. It was pretty fun. They're not bad. I like hard-shell, though - some people made them with soft-shell.

WHO: Miranda Cosgrove with opener Greyson Chance

WHEN | WHERE: 7 p.m. Sunday, NYCB Theatre at Westbury, 960 Brush Hollow Road, Westbury

INFO: $29.50-$100; 516- 334-0800, livenation.com

Greyson Chance, middle school sensation

Last year at this time, Greyson Chance was a typical middle-school student in Edmond, Okla.

"I was probably in math class trying to pick up a girl to go to the movies with that night," Chance says, laughing. "Now things are a lot more hectic. I love hectic."

"Hectic" is an understatement. The 13-year-old, discovered last year on YouTube when he did his piano-based interpretation ofLady Gaga's "Paparazzi" for his sixth-grade festival, is currently on his first tour, writing and recording his major-label debut album and enjoying his first single, "Waiting Outside the Lines."

"My head is still spinning," Chance says, calling from a tour stop inMilwaukee.

THE 'PAPARAZZI' PLAN: One reason Chance's YouTube video stood out was his dramatic new arrangement. "It has some dramatic pauses because I'm very dramatic and theatrical," he says. "I think people liked it because it was different. . . . I only put it up on YouTube to show my friends. This was all unexpected."

THE NEW ALBUM: Chance isn't sure when his still-untitled album will come out on Ellen DeGeneres' eleveneleven label, but he's happy about how it's coming along. "I'm writing a lot of the record," he says. "It's influenced by Snow Patrol and Coldplay. I want to do something that's real."

BUYING THE SINGLE: Chance says he had to buy his single when it came out in the stores. "I went to Target," he says, laughing. "I had my hood on and a hat and picked it up. It felt so good."